The Onion apologizes for Oscar-night Quvenzhane Wallis tweet

Oscars 2013 jab at Quvenzhane Wallis removed; The Onion apologizes

After an Oscar night tweet about Academy Awards nominee Quvenzhane Wallis provoked outrage on Twitter, satirical news organization The Onion has apologized for the gaffe, calling it “inconsistent with The Onion’s commitment to parody and satire, however biting.”

“No person should be subjected to such a senseless, humorless comment masquerading as satire,” Onion CEO Steve Hannah said in a statement on Facebook. “We have instituted new and tighter Twitter procedures to ensure that this kind of mistake does not occur again.”

The tweet in question was sent out from The Onion’s official Twitter account during its Oscar-night coverage, which was characteristically wry and largely parody. In it, The Onion used a vulgar term in reference to nine-year-old Beasts of the Southern Wild star and best actress nominee Quvenzhane Wallis. The tweet was deleted roughly an hour after it was sent out, but was retweeted several times — a screengrab is below (warning: the image below contains foul language):

The tweet was met with almost immediate outrage, with many online decrying The Onion’s targeting of a nine-year-old girl, let alone their choice of epithet.

This isn't hard @theonion, just explain that u tried to make a joke abt the way ppl talk abt actresses in media & it failed & was offensive.